Calls and Prayers
by Tibbins
Summary: Continuation of 13x07. Sam and Dean plan their next move. Heavily implied Destiel. One-shot
1. Chapter 1

**Hey guys!**

 **So what did you think of the latest episode? Personally, I wasn't too keen. I LOVED Dean going full on torturer for Ketch though, and the scenes between Cas and Lucifer were brilliant. But the rest of it kinda fell a bit flat for me. It didn't really seem to develop very much and there was practically no Sam in it at all.**

 **So here's a one-shot about where I'm hoping they'll go from here. 1. Because there is NO WAY Dean bought Asmodeus' Cas voice, and 2. Because there was no sense of character development in the episode itself really (imo anyway), so I wanted to include a little bit of that.**

 **Enjoy ^_^**

He was still rattled from the whole Ketch thing. That was all. That was the only reason that Cas' voice sounded wrong. Ketch was back, _everything_ seemed wrong.

"You okay?" he asked his brother. The one, stable thing in his life right now.

Sam huffed out a breath, "not really," he said, "I actually believed him. It was the dumbest story I'd ever heard but I _believed_ him."

"Don't beat yourself up," Dean said, "he's a good liar. Sometimes, the stupidest lies sound the most plausible _because_ they're so dumb. I mean, who actually _tries_ to pull the evil twin crap?"

"You didn't buy it, not for a second." Sam pressed his palms to his eyes, "how could I have been so stupid?"

"Because you _want_ to see the good in everything," Dean said, pressing down on the gas a little harder, "you've never been down with locking people up on the off chance they might be dicks."

"And you?"

Dean smirked, it was a humourless thing. "I've got a special place of hate for that man," he said, it was almost a growl, "he makes my skin crawl, it doesn't matter what name he uses."

"I'm sorry I didn't believe you."

Dean shrugged, "that's not who you are, Sam. That's why we balance," he glanced over at his brother, he was hunched back in the passenger seat, as low as he could go without cramping his legs. He had just wanted to do the kind thing, he always tried so hard to be kind. Dean softened his voice, "without you around I would have killed a lot more innocent things for a lot worse reasons. Sometimes it works your way, sometimes it doesn't. This time it didn't. That doesn't mean you stop doing things your way, alright?"

Sam looked over at him and forced a small smile. Dean nodded.

"Right. So now, we find Cas,"

"I thought you said-"

"Yeah, but… I dunno, something was off about it. The way he spoke… it was weird."

"Weird how, exactly?"

Dean sighed, trying to frame the words in his head. How he had spoken, it had been deliberate, slow. He hadn't seemed concerned when Dean mentioned being cornered by demons, hadn't explained _why_ the demons had been there in the first place, it had been an ambush, they'd been waiting to attack, _after_ Cas had already escaped? That didn't sound right. No signal? He'd picked up the phone, hadn't he? Dean didn't know how to explain any of this without sounding crazy. So he picked the thing that bothered him the most.

"He said 'hello' wrong."

Sam blinked, "what?"

Dean rolled his head to the side, cricking his neck in the process. He _knew_ how it sounded, did he have to explain?

"The way he said, 'hello, Dean'. It wasn't the way he normally says it." He threw a sideways glance at his brother, Sam's eyebrows had shot up almost to his hairline.

"You're kidding?"

"I'm not."

Sam leaned forward, a stupid grin on his face. Dean scowled, waiting for the question he knew would come,

"So, how does he normally say it?"

"Differently." He said shortly. Then, after a heartbeat, "shut up. Look, something's wrong, we need to find him."

"And Jack?"

"Cas first. The kid doesn't wanna be found and he's hiding good enough that _we_ can't find him, he'll be fine. Besides, Cas is the one to talk Jack back when we _do_ find him so…"

"So, Cas first." Sam bit his lip and nodded slowly, pulling his phone from his pocket, "I'll track his cell again."

"You do that." Dean grunted, falling into a tense silence.

It was a few minutes before Sam spoke again, a frown creasing his brow, "I can't get a read."

Dean jerked his head around, "you what?"

"The GPS won't track. It says it's connecting but it's not showing up anywhere on the map."

"That makes no sense, he answered his phone like ten minutes ago, you're telling me he's just not around anymore?"

"Maybe he turned the GPS off?"

"Why would he do that?"

"I don't know, Dean, you said he had a lead, maybe he doesn't wanna be tracked by something else."

"Well that's a comforting thought. Maybe we should just go home and forget about it." Dean's voice dripped with sarcasm while Sam rolled his eyes.

"Look, let me get my laptop out, I might be able to do more on that."

Dean reluctantly pulled over at the next diner they came to. He was hungry, and being worried _and_ hungry was never a good mix. Besides, as funny as it was watching Sam squash his laptop onto his knee, he figured it might be more productive if he had the space to get something done. Sam frowned as he typed, ordering coffee and a chicken wrap from the sunny waitress. Dean got coffee too and a steak sandwich, which he tore into when it arrived, shaking the waitresses smile somewhat. Dean glared at the back of the open laptop as he ate. Eventually, Sam sighed and looked up at him.

"Dean, calm down. We don't know that Cas is in trouble."

"My gut knows." Dean growled, "and my gut has been right about everything today so far."

"Because Cas said 'hello' differently?"

"That's right."

"You know how ridiculous that sounds, right? This is _Cas_ we're talking about, he does this, he disappears on some mission on his own and then he comes back. You're way too worked up about this."

"Am I?" Dean's leg was bouncing vigorously under the table and the hand not holding his sandwich clenched and unclenched at his side. He knew he was overreacting, he _knew_ that Cas liked to follow stuff up on his own. But dammit, he trusted his gut, "why don't we find him first and then you can _both_ can tell me how ridiculous I'm being?"

Sam sighed and ran a hand through his hair. Looking at Dean with poorly disguised pity, "look, I get it, okay? You're worried. But Cas can take care of himself. You know, sometimes you treat him like he doesn't know what he's doing. Like he's a child who doesn't understand how the world works. He's been a soldier longer than we've been alive. He's an _angel_ , Dean. He's been around for millennia. He's tough to kill."

"Not that tough," Dean muttered, almost to himself. He reached for his coffee and took a long gulp, ignoring the fact that it was too hot. Squashing down the memory of broken wings imprinted in the ground, like the skeletons of leaves.

"I'm sorry." Sam said, voice softened, "I know he's not been back long and you're scared to lose him again. But you've gotta trust him, man. Let him do his thing. I don't think I can find him anyway." Sam closed the laptop, "maybe he found Jack and he's shielding both of them?"

Dean grunted in response, not trusting himself to reply. Sam clearly thought this was over. He slid his laptop back into his bag and placed it on the seat next to him, taking a sip of his coffee before starting on the wrap. Dean pushed his empty plate away. The food had helped, a little. Maybe he _was_ overreacting. But his gut still churned and that 'hello Dean', rolled around his head on a loop. It _had_ been different. It had been _less_ somehow. Though less what, he didn't know.

"We still gotta find him."

Sam sighed, placing his wrap down, "Dean-"

Dean raised a hand, cutting him off, "I hear what you're saying okay? I know that this whole Ketch thing has got us shaken up, and that we still need to find Jack and I _know_ Cas doesn't need me to babysit him. Just humour me. Something was wrong. I just… I need to make sure he's okay and it's not like we have anything else to do right now except wait around and I know you're about as keen to be benched as I am. If he's fine, I'll back off. But don't you think it's weird that we ran into a herd of demons that just _happened_ to be where Cas was supposed to be?"

Sam sat back and crossed his arms, "okay, that was odd. But there could be another explanation. Let's be logical about this, you said his voice was off, right? So let's say he's in trouble, calling back would only mean that Cas still wouldn't be able to talk freely. So, get him to call you."

"How?"

Sam shrugged, "pray to him. Tell him to call you within an hour or you're gonna know something's wrong. Prayers can't go sideways, right? It'll go straight to Cas and if he's fine, he'll call."

Dean pressed his lips together, it was a solid plan. Sam stared at him expectantly.

"Well?" He said, "are you gonna do it?"

"Now?" Dean shifted his weight, uncomfortably. Sam just raised an eyebrow, "fine," he clasped his hands on the table although he knew it didn't matter. He supposed he _could_ pray silently but that never felt right to him. If he was trying to talk to Cas he wanted to _talk_. "Uh, okay, Cas, I'm praying to you. 'cause I think there was something off about that last phone call, so… call me back in the next hour or I'm coming for you." He glanced at Sam, and then away again, hyper-aware that his brother was listening. "Sam thinks you're fine. And you probably are, but give me a call anyway. That's it," he dropped his hands and sat back, plucking his phone from his pocket and dropping it on the table while motioning to the waitress for another coffee.

"Now, we wait," Sam said, going back to his wrap.

After twenty minutes had gone by, Dean excused himself to the bathroom, leaving the phone on the table. He splashed some water on his face and took some deep breaths to try and ease the knot of tension in his chest. After a moment he looked up at the florescent lights.

"Okay," he said aloud, "so, I know I gave you an hour. I know I'm probably just being paranoid because Ketch is back and there were a lot of demons we had to gank. And I'm sorry if I'm interrupting your 'interesting lead' or whatever but I just really need to know that you're okay. I just got you back, man, and I can't go back to that place again, I just can't. So, if you need to do this angel meet up thing on your own, I get it. Just take five minutes to call me. Please."

He waited another minute before heading back to the table and sat down to stare at his silent phone.

As the rest of the hour ticked by, even Sam started to get restless. It had been fifty-eight minutes of the hour before he finally stood up.

"You're right," he said, slinging his laptop bag over his shoulder, "he should have called by now."

Dean said nothing but followed him back to the impala.

As Dean pulled out of the parking lot and back onto the open road, Sam shifted in his seat,

"What about Ketch?" He asked, quietly.

Dean's grip tightened slightly on the wheel,

"What about him?"

"Do we just… let him go?"

"We didn't let him go, Sam, he got away, there's a difference."

"Right, but-"

"But what? Look. I'm not thrilled at the prospect of him being out there either, but we have bigger problems right now."

"Dean, he's killing people!"

"He's killing witches! Which, you know, so do we."

Dean could feel Sam's disapproval radiating out next to him,

"Only the ones who hurt innocent people. Ketch isn't making that distinction."

"I agree with you, Sammy but until we take care of our _family_ , I'm not gonna commit to a wild British goose chase, okay? We can't waste time."

"What if we don't get any leads?"

"If that happens, we'll talk about it." Dean conceded, "I wanna know what the scumbag's up to too. But I won't put Ketch before Cas as though he's worth my time. I won't do it."

"So you'll stand for symbolism over people's lives?" Sam's voice was getting louder, angrier, which only made Dean's own blood heat up.

"Cas' life could be in danger too, Sam!" He snapped, "I _know_ what I heard and you agreed that he'd have called by now if he was fine. So he's not fine. So we _find_ him. And I don't care if that means leaving Ketch to keep picking up paychecks for murder, okay? I just don't care. We find Cas. And we bring him home."

Sam was silent for a moment.

"You're right," he said, "I'm sorry."

Dean grunted in acknowledgement.

"Look," he said, glancing at his brother's pained expression, "I didn't mean to fly off the handle. I know that Ketch is a bastard and I know you feel like crap for believing his stupid story so you wanna get all the answers you can from him and I _know_ you wanna get Jack back just as bad. But we _know_ Cas is in trouble. And I won't abandon him, not again. I can't. So if that means you go off and do your own search, that's fine. Like I said, you've gotta keep doing things your way. But you can't pull me back from this, not until I find him."

Sam nodded. Then he reached over and patted his brother on the arm.

"I'm with you, Dean."

"Thanks, Sam." Dean said, and he meant it. As willing as he was to go this alone, he didn't relish the prospect, especially if his brother was equally alone, hunting down a toffee-nosed psychopath.

"So where do we start?" Sam asked, as he once again pulled his laptop out and rested it on his knees in the passenger seat, "there's more equipment back at the bunker, but if we can't find Jack, chances are we won't have any more luck with Cas."

"Well, he was going to commune with the angels," Dean said, "we could start there,"

"The sandbox? You think he might have been taken back to Heaven?"

Dean stared ahead at the road.

"What else have we got? Last thing we actually _know_ he was meeting with an angel,"

"Last we _know_ , he was in that bar."

"Right, but that turned out to be nest of demons and we killed the evidence," Dean pointed out. "The sandbox is our best bet, at least for now, see where that leads us."

"Okay," Sam said, settling back in his seat for the long drive ahead. Then, "we'll get him back, Dean,"

"Yeah," Dean said flatly. Only because the alternative was unthinkable, "we will."

 **So what do you think?**

 **It's kinda short and there's not much plot but it feels like a kinda nice in between thing, building up to the story for the next episode (I can only hope, though it doesn't look like it with the promo :( ) with a bit more character focus than we got in the episode itself.**

 **All feedback is welcome, appreciated and loved.**

 **Love Tibbins xx**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hey guys!**

 **So I _know_ I said this was going to be a one-shot but I was posed with the interesting idea of writing a second chapter from Cas' point of view and well... I just couldn't pass that opportunity up apparently.**

 **Thank you so much Catastrophic Mastermind for giving me the idea.**

 **It's a little shorter than the previous chapter (I have been rather busy this weekend, house-hunting and the like, exciting stuff.) but I hope it still works.**

 **Enjoy ^_^**

Castiel paced his cell, stopping at each turn to look out at the stone corridor beyond the bars. He'd tried calling to Lucifer, perhaps together they could figure a way out of this, as much as the idea repulsed him. But either Satan wasn't feeling particularly chatty, or the cell blocked all sound precisely for that reason.

Once he tired of pacing, he sat on the stone bench, hands in his lap. Well, he wasn't dead. That was something at least, something that probably meant that Asmodeus needed him, which was less of a comfort than still being alive.

 _Don't do anything stupid_ Dean had said. And what had Castiel done? Fallen directly into a trap set by the angels, got mixed up with _Lucifer_ and let slip information about Jack, _and_ he'd managed to get captured by Asmodeus who was also hunting for Jack.

"Dean's going to kill me," he muttered to himself. On the positive side, he might not live long enough to have to endure all of the 'I told you so's' that Dean would no doubt berate him with. He almost smiled at the thought.

He was supposed to be searching for Jack. He was out there somewhere, alone, with no protection and with angels and demons both hunting him. He had failed. His one task since he had returned from the dead and he had already failed. Sooner or later, _someone_ was going to find Jack. He could only hope that it would be Sam and Dean.

 _Uh, okay, Cas, I'm praying to you._

The prayer filtered to him, Dean's voice. He cocked his head to listen, brow furrowing. Dean never prayed for no reason.

' _cause I think there was something off about that last phone call,_

Perhaps his improvisation skills _could_ use improvement. In his own defence, he _had_ been trying to tell Dean about Lucifer, until the Devil in question had been so suddenly, and rudely, present. He hadn't even gotten around to speaking of him, that particular idiom was apparently unfounded. But that phone call had been hours ago, had Dean not picked up on the cue by now?

Dean swallowed hard in the midst of his prayer, that kind of background action often didn't translate, but with Dean, somehow it always did. Perhaps praying aloud had something to do with it. Dean sounded like he was trying to mask something. From him? Castiel sat up straighter, had something terrible happened to Jack?

 _so… call me back in the next hour or I'm coming for you._

"Dean, no," Castiel sighed. The _last_ thing he needed was for the Winchesters to get captured by Asmodeus too. Assuming of course that the Prince of Hell didn't kill them outright. His stomach twisted at the thought. Either way, they needed to stay away. They needed to spend their time looking for Jack.

 _Sam thinks you're fine. And you probably are, but give me a call anyway. That's it._

Castiel huffed out a small, humourless laugh and rubbed at his eyes with his fingertips. If this had been any other time, he would have accused Dean of being paranoid and over-protective. Instead, he was right. He'd lost his cell phone in the fight at the bar, not that Asmodeus' goons would have let him keep it in any case. His angel blade was also gone, of course, and the cell itself was bare. He sighed and dropped his head into his hands. He could only hope that Sam managed to convince Dean that Castiel would make his way back on his own. A feat that he fully intended to do, provided of course, that he got the chance.

Minutes passed and nothing happened, he heard nothing but the shift of his clothing as he moved, or his footsteps when he paced, his heartbeat thumping uncomfortably in his ears, he saw nothing except endless stone and the metal, warded bars. There was some kind of orange fungus growing in one corner and Castiel knelt down to inspect it, glad of the spot of colour in the otherwise monotonous grey, but it was not an Earth fungus, full of intricacies of fascinating design. This was something fouler, detestable, almost mechanical, feeding not on detritus but on suffering. He withdrew and sat back on the bench. Waiting for something to happen.

 _Okay, so, I know I gave you an hour._

Dean's prayer came to him once again and he couldn't help but smile. He might not have any way of keeping time in this place, but it had definitely been less than an hour. Probably less than half that. Dean was definitely worried. That strangeness in his tone was gone as well, replaced with the echoing quality of a bathroom. Perhaps he had been praying aloud in front of Sam. Castiel had never truly understood why it made such a difference, the brothers shared everything after all. But Dean was a very private person, particularly when it came to his prayers, and Castiel had a suspicion that the Hunter was almost embarrassed whenever he prayed, as though his faith was something to be ashamed of.

 _I know I'm probably just being paranoid because Ketch is back and there were a lot of demons we had to gank._

Ketch? Dead, Man of Letters Ketch? And demons? Had Asmodeus sent demons after them? Or had Sam and Dean come looking for him after all and run into the leftovers from his and Lucifer's short and unsuccessful fight? Castiel shifted and sat up straighter, hoping that Dean would elaborate.

 _And I'm sorry if I'm interrupting your 'interesting lead' or whatever but I just really need to know that you're okay._

Interesting lead? Castiel tilted his head, confused. He _had_ said that interesting things were happening but nothing about a lead. In fact, he had outright said that he _didn't_ have a lead on Jack.

 _I just got you back, man, and I can't go back to that place again, I just can't._

Dean's voice cracked with pain and Castiel instinctively reached out a hand to comfort him before recovering himself. Since being back, Castiel hadn't really had time to consider the impact that his death would have had on Dean, the man always took losing people hard. He had been nothing but supportive and downright cheerful around him. But judging by the tone of his prayer, that wasn't the whole story.

 _So, if you need to do this angel meet up thing on your own, I get it. Just take five minutes to call me. Please._

Castiel shook his head, a ball of sorrow congealing in his chest. He wished he could. In that moment, he wished that he could comfort Dean more than anything. He had been touched when Dean had offered to come with him. He had expected an outright 'no' from the Hunter, Dean tried to force safety on those he loved, and he had been on the receiving end of that particular instinct several times and although he understood it, it was no less frustrating. Instead, he had offered his assistance. And when that didn't work, his support. Castiel had felt so strong leaving the bunker. Often, if he had his own mission and was called away from the Winchesters, he left with Dean's disappointment, or his anger, or his concern. This time, he had felt Dean at his side, despite leaving alone.

More time passed but no more words came through from Dean. The hour he had been given was up, the brothers would be coming for him whether he wanted it or not. And knowing Dean as he did… despite the odds stacked against them, despite the power that had radiated from the Prince of Hell who had made _Lucifer_ flinch, despite the danger he posed to both the Winchesters and to Jack, Castiel felt an irrational stab of pity for Asmodeus.

 **So what do you think?**

 **As I said it's shorter and I'm not 100% sure I captured Castiel as well as I could have done, but it demanded to be written and I knew I wouldn't be able to focus on anything else until it was done.**

 **All feedback is welcomed with open arms and loved forever.**

 **Love Tibbins xx**


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